Maika Piya

No less a Bollywood icon than Hema Malini launched this fusion album of traditional melodies and contemporary music by Lalitya Munshaw. The album features a range of seasoned musicians including Niladri Kumar on sitar, Ronu Majumdar on flute and Ranjit Barot on the drums.

Munshaw, a classically trained musician, has also performed with Hariharan, Anup Jalota, Pankaj Udhas and Louis Banks in the past. Our picks on the 9 tracks of this album include the title track Maika Piya (based on raag Kalavati), Saiya and Baiya na Dharo.

Author: Madanmohan Rao

Madanmohan Rao is an author and media consultant from Bangalore, and global correspondent for world music and jazz for World Music Central and Jazzuality. He has written over 15 books on media, management and culture, and is research director for YourStory Media. Madan was formerly World Music Editor at Rave magazine and RJ at WorldSpace, and can be followed on Twitter at @MadanRao.